The Night and The Day
by Aigoopi
Summary: AU. Austin Moon is the world's most famous rockstar and due to heartbreak completely out of control. So his agency brings in songwriter Ally Dawson, who is as brilliant as she is desperate. She needs a job - and what she gets is Austin Moon's crazy everyday life.
1. Segways & Red Envelopes

Title: The Night and the Day (1/?)  
Genre: dramatic romcom, AU  
Rating: currently T, M for later chapters  
Couple: Austin/Ally  
Summary: Austin Moon is the world's most famous rockstar and due to heartbreak completely out of control. So his agency brings in songwriter Ally Dawson, who is as brilliant as she is desperate. She needs a job - and what she gets is Austin Moon's crazy everyday life.

Chapter 1 - Segways & Red Envelopes

Ally first contact with Austin Moon happened through his manager: She was a small Latino woman, petite even, but loud and cheerfully desperate. Ally's first note of her had been a red envelope that said "urgent", but Ally got a thousand of those a day, so she had pointedly ignored it.

Another red envelope had arrived after that and another and another - they grew both in size and number and finally, one day, the mailman had pulled a giant red envelope up the stairs of her house. Later, much later, Ally would meet Dez - big props were "his thing" and the size of the envelope had been his idea.

But then, in the face of the huffing mailman who had carried that thing three flightsof stairs, the entire thing had just seemed weird and ridiculous. She had signed for the envelope, of course, had pulled it through her door and opened it. The letter inside was regular-sized. It said "De La Rosa Management" on the top of the letter and the letter was polite, formal and reeked of desperation.

They said she could drop by whenever she liked, because they were looking for a new songwriter for Austin Moon.

Ally had heard of it. The entertainment world was abuzz of it. The tabloids had huge splashes of it all over their front pages about Austin Moon and how his regular songwriter, Cassidy Kennedy, had left him. Nine months ago this had been big news - now, it was just somewhere drifting along page twenty. And Ally knew that his record company was getting nervous, because since then Austin had neither written a song, nor had he announced a new album nor had he appeared at any gig. He had also worn out around two dozen of Ally's songwriter collegues - those were the things the tabloids didn't write about. They were thinking about founding a support group - the worn-out songwriters, not the tabloids, of course.

Austin Moon, meanwhile, had just disappeared from the scene - and given that Austin was his company's biggest asset, she knew they would do anything to keep him.

However she wondered what had caused them to contact her. She hadn't written anything for a popstar in at least five years; since then all her piano and imagination produced were dramatic, slow ballads, most of them sad. Some of her songs had popped up here and there at independent labels and the occasional mainstream label, too, but nothing to catch attention of a big production company.

Yet, the big, red envelope sitting in her kitchen was hard to ignore. For a moment, she considered considering it a joke - who, with a serious business proposition in their mind, would send her a door-sized red envelope?

She thought about the sender. Patricia Maria De La Rosa was completely unknown to her. She was executive producer of Austin Moon's agency, but that was about all Ally knew about the woman. Her company was well-known, though. Many of the greater popstars were signed by them and some of Ally's colleagues had sold songs to them. But none of her immediate friends had worked with Austin Moon.

Austin had the reputation of being difficult, out-of-control, eccentric, more concerned with alcoholic beverages and groupies than his own life. He was a typical rockstar, a rockstar of the old school. Why would Ally write songs for someone like Austin Moon? Someone who didn't even have a classical musical education, who was a loose cannon more than anything, who, as she was informed, couldn't even write and read notes properly?

Ally was about to crumble the letter she had received, when ...

"Mom?"

Ally turned. A little boy with dark hair and dark eyes padded into the kitchen. He rubbed his eyes slowly and yawned gently. He was wearing blue and white striped PJs and held Dougie the dolphin in his free hand.

"Who is it from?" he asked, still rubbing his eyes. He went over to the freezer and opened it, taking out a box of milk. The box was placed on the table next to the glass he used earlier in the day. Ally watched with some fascination how her son climbed onto a chair, placed Dougie carefully onto another chair and then filled his glass with milk.

"You should go to bed, Denny," she said, but she knew the little boy wouldn't.

"Who is it from?" he asked again.

"Austin Moon," Ally answered.

"Oh, I know him. Some of the girls at my school like him." He thought about it. "And some of the teachers, too. Why did he write a letter to you?"

"He asked me if I considered writing songs for him," Ally said slowly.

"You mean a new job?" the boy asked. He looked at his mother excitedly through his white milk beard. "That's good, right?"

"I guess," Ally said. She absentmindedly crinkled the letter. She had stopped nibbling at her hair out of nervousness. It wasn't good for her son, seeing her like that. She didn't want him to copy her. Yet, she wished she could bite her hair, because now seemed like a good time.

She was sure that the offer of Austin's management company was a good one, but working for the bigger companies usually involved a lot of stress and overtime. And she had to think of her son. Denton needed the attention of his mother. She couldn't leave him alone.

But then again ...

He attended a good school, so tuition was needed and his school uniform and not to mention money for all the trips they went on. Ally's father could do only so much - and she relied on him much more than was already necessary.

"Will you stop working at grandpa's store?" the boy asked.

Ally took a deep breath. "I don't know yet, Denny." She nodded at the door. "You really need to go to bed now. You have school tomorrow."

In some aspects, her son was like a being from another planet. He got up and placed the empty glass into the sink. Kissing Ally on the cheek, he wished her a good night and went to bed. There was never much of a fight when it came to that. There was never much of a fight over anything. It was as if Denny had come out of her aged fourty, and not aged seven, like he should have been.

She brooded over De La Rosa Company's suggestion for the entire day. She would visit their offices the other day and offer them her terms and conditions. If they declined, she would go on with her life as it was, if they accepted, she would be the luckiest girl on the planet.

Either way, she refused to be surprised. Even though money was sparse, she would endure, she knew, and she would never let Denny feel anything else besides happiness and a sense of completeness.

Yes. That was the plan.

With those kind of thoughts, she went to bed in the evening, her sleep dreamless and quiet.

Little did she know that events had been set in motion that would turn her life upside down. Plans were a good things, but if destiny decided to mess with you - especially for its own amusement - you could cheerfully wave at your plans as they walked the plank.

But Ally, of course, didn't know that.

The next day, she dropped Denny off at school, gave him a kiss on his cheek and then drove her old red Volvo Estate over to the huge, high tech building of De La Rosa Entertainment. She parked her car between something that looked like an IPhone turned into a vehicle and another that looked like the Mars Lander. Compared to those two, her own car looked like an relict from a gone-awry time travel attempt.

The building of Austin Moon's entertainment agency looked like a toaster made from blue glass and white steel. It was very sleek, very futuristic, very pretty, but somehow somebody had overdone it.

There was a huge ever-changing billboard with Austin Moon's face on it. The album's title was from last year, she noticed. Another picture changed to another starlet the company was representing - and while Ally made her way to the entrance, the billboard changed another dozen times or so.

Three times, pictures of a red-haired lanky guy roasting hamburgers on a xylophone and a chubby Latino woman popped up. Both looked slightly manic to Ally. She had no idea who they were - maybe a new duo the company promoted?

But whatever music they made, it was either really folksy, really alternative or really experimental. Or all three of them combined.

The main entrance doors opened automatically with a whooshing sound and moments later the Miami heat was replaced by the carefully regulated temperature of an air conditioning system. Before her, the lobby opened, wide and spacious, with everything made from glass and steel and white plastic.

She rose her head - the building was hollow in it's middle. Above her, she could see huge balconies cascading toward the roof made from glass. People walked there, on their way to their bureaus. She could hear them talk softly.

She looked around for someone she could check in with and noticed a round counter close by the entrance. Her steps clacked on the polished white floor when she made her way over.

Ally paused when she saw he girl behind the counter in the huge entrance hall. She wore a white, futuristic headset, wore a sleek, white catsuit and dark hair waved down her shoulders. Ally also assumed that she did bodybuilding or something similar as a hobby, because she was around thrice Ally's size. Her demeanour was slightly angry as she roared into her headphone:

"Two dozen bloody donuts! And a yellow turtle! How difficult can it be?" Then she ended the conversation and directed her attention at Ally.

A part of Ally didn't want that attention at all and instead wished herself back into bed.

"Hello, welcome to De La Rosa, how may I help you?" she asked. There was a name tag attached to her clothes: It said "Mindy".

"Uhm, hi," Ally said. "My name is Ally Dawson, Miss De La Rosa is expecting me?"

Mindy's previously darkened face lightened up significantly. She produced a smile that made Ally even more afraid. "But of course! I'll inform them you are on your way." She disappeared for a moment behind the counter, then appeared again, with a basket filled with cakes. "If you could deliver this to Dez?"

_Who is Dez?_"Sure," Ally said, just to get out of the immediate range of the shark smile of that girl.

Mindy handed her the basket with cakes. "Their bureau is in the penthouse," she said and waved her off.

Ally fled to the elevator. A lift boy, dressed all monochromatic like Mindy send her off to the highest floor of the building and Ally was already debating methods on how to tell them "no".

Their offer was tempting, but the their receptionist alone was enough to creep her out. Plus, the building, the billboard, the Apple-vibe of it all; it wasn't her style.

She was Wall-E and everything around her was EVE. She would not fit it.

The elevator doors dinged apart and Ally stepped into a white, immaculate, long corridor. Doors opened to each site and the only spot of color were plants, scattered around once in awhile. Besides that, everything was empty.

Maybe the wrong floor?

She turned around, but the elevator doors closed already. The lift boy waved at her through the closing slit of the doors. Then, she was alone.

"Hello?" she called.

Nobody answered.

"Hello?" she tried again.

This time, someone _did _answer, however not as she hoped they would.

"Be careful! Out of my way!"

She turned, just in time, to see Austin Moon - popstar, actor and humanitarian, if you believed TMZ - on a Segway, racing down the corridor toward her, the red-haired, freckled guy from the billboard racing after him.

She didn't remember the collision, only how she fell. She remembered a short period of darkness and when she opened her eyes again, faces appeared in her besparkled point of view. Reality seemed to dance around her.

The faces belonged to Austin Moon, of course, Freckle Guy and the Latino Girl from the billboard.

"Is it still alive?" Freckle Guy asked.

"God, Dez, you can't just ask someone if they are still alive," Austin said. "Plus, it blinks. It surely looks quite alive."

"I told you, no Segway races in the corridor," Latino Girl said. "It scares the alligators."

Alligators.

Ally definitely didn't want to work here.

"Is she the new secretary?" Freckle Guy asked.

"There should be a sign for no racing in the corridors," Ally mumbled, and to their expressions of shock, surprise and confusion, she fell unconscious.

Her last thoughts were:

_I will most certainly not work for Austin Moon. Decisions are a great thing._

_And, just out of curiousity:_

_There are alligators?_

end (1/?)


	2. Plastic Palaces & Music Contracts

Title: Night and Day (2/?)  
Genre: dramatic romcom, AU  
Rating: currently PG, M for later chapters  
Couple: Austin/Ally  
Summary: Austin Moon is the world's most famous rockstar and due to heartbreak completely out of control. So his agency brings in songwriter Ally Dawson, who is as brilliant as she is desperate. She needs a job - and what she gets is Austin Moon's crazy everyday life.

Chapter 2 - Plastic Palaces & Music Contracts

When Ally woke, she felt the soft comfort of a couch beneath her. The ceiling was white - like seemingly everything in that weird building - but several dozens of strange lamps were attached to it. It took her some time to return to reality fully and when she did, her brain identified the "strange lamps" as ketchup bottles someone had glued under the ceiling.

The realization of the thought made her fast awake and she almost jumped off the couch. Another spell of dizziness hit her and slowly, like in slow motion, she sank bank onto the couch.

"Oh, good, you are awake." It was Freckle Boy. He sat behind the huge desk within the room. A name sign on the desk said "Dez". No surname included. More weirdness.

The room itself turned out to be a bureau. The walls were covered with Austin Moon posters from his various albums and the couple of films he had done. No music instruments, but lots of camera equipment, she noticed.

"Why do you have ketchup bottles glued to your ceiling?" Ally asked slowly, trying to sit up again.

"Because I don't like mustard. Duh!" Freckle Boy answered. He extended a hand. "I'm Dez," he said. "I'm Austin's personal music video director."

"Pleased to meet you," Ally said slowly. _And by pleased I mean totally weirded out by your bureau. There should be a rule that ketchup bottles should not be glued to the ceiling. _"Ally Dawson."

"You came!" Ally's hand was yanked into another chaotic handshake, this time by the Latino girl. "Patricia De La Rosa. But just call me Trish. Everyone does."

"You are the owner of De La Rosa Records," Ally said, surprised. She didn't imagine a manager to look so - so - so … happy. Delightful. Chaotic.

"And De La Rosa Entertainment. And De La Rosa Investment. And De La Rosa Creative Agency. But who wants details," Dez said, slightly miffed. He rolled his eyes in a exaggerated way.

"Dez's just angry that it says De La Rosa, even if he's the co-owner," Trish said. "But Trez Entertainment has just such a weird ring to it."

"I was rooting for Big Things Entertainment," Dez said. "But you wouldn't let me."

Trish cast him a dark glance, then chose to ignore him. "You are here because of the job interview, aren't you?"

Before Ally could say anything, Dez grasped her hands and was immediately in her personal space. His voice grew whiney. "Please tell me you are here because of the job interview!"

Ally pushed him gently away, while Trish whispered a harsh: "_Dez!_" Her face turned softer when she approached Ally again. "Look. We are searching for a songwriter for Austin Moon and so far we haven't found -" She struggled for the diplomatic way to say this. "The right person yet."

"Because he has scared them all away, right?" Ally said.

"No!" Trish hurried to answer.

"Yes," Dez nodded solemnly. "Austin's currently a bit difficult, so we need someone who _makes _him work."

"Makes him work?" Ally said. She was beginning to understand why so many before her had run for the hills. "What exactly -"

"As a matter of fact," Dez said, before anyone could stop him. "The best solution would be some kind of live-in-songwriter."

"A live-in-songwriter?" Ally said slowly, not sure she had heard correctly. Her eyes wandered to Trish, expecting her to elbow Dez again, but much to her surprise, Trish didn't.

"Someone who _makes _him sing songs, who gets him involved," Trish said, matter-of-factly. "He hasn't been producing anything for ages and he refuses to sing anything he hasn't at least co-written, so we desperately need someone to help out with this. You have written _Greatest Love Song _for Selena Gomez, haven't you?"

"Yes," Ally said. "I have, but you need to know -"

Trish ignored her. "That was such a great love song."

"The greatest, even," Dez quipped. He was still being ignored.

"We imagine you write something for Austin like that," Trish continued.

"Only an entire album of it," Dez added, as if producing _an entire album _was the easiest thing to accomplish. "When can you start?"

"Woah, woah, slow down, you," Ally started. "First of all, I'm a songwriter and not a babysitter. I don't do _live-in. _Second of all, an _entire album? _Do you have any idea how much work goes into writing an entire album? It could take eight months, maybe even a year! And third, I _have a son. _He needs to go to school - I can't move in with a crazy rockstar and just leave Denny behind."

"And I don't want her to move in!" The door had opened and Austin stood there. He was carrying a single wheel of his Segway. He turned to Ally. "No offense, but," his eyes shot over to Dez and Trish. "I don't want another songwriter! I'll manage to produce my songs on my own!"

"You haven't written anything so far," Trish said.

"I'll start," Austin promised.

"And the stuff you have written was sad-sad-sad-sad-sad-sad-sad," Dez added. "And did I mention _sad_?"

"You are a popstar! And a heart throb! The occasional sad song is alright, but we cannot make an entire album of it. What are we supposed to call it? Sadness?" Trish asked.

Austin shuffled his feet, scratching the spot behind his ear. Trish had hit a sore spot. "Nooooo," he said, drawing out the word.

"And besides that, you are not exactly brilliant when you write songs on your own," Dez said.

"What?!" Austin said. "I am brilliant! I am _awesome_!"

Trish produced a small piece of paper, presumably covered with lyrics. Ally couldn't see much, because the handwriting was apocalyptically bad. Austin Moon never had gone to Calligraphy Camp in his entire life, Ally knew.

"_I'm so sad, sad, sad, this is bad, bad, bad, because I'm so saaaaad_," Trish deadpanned. _Ouch._She looked up, her thin eyebrows raising. She waved with the paper. "You seriously call this brilliant?"

"It sounds different with a melody," Austin snapped at her, snatching the piece of paper from her. He cuddled it possessively against his chest.

Trish pointed at him as if she was presenting some sort of product to sell. "As you can see, Ally, we are in desperate need of help."

"And move in _with him_?" Ally asked. "During our first meeting, he almost broke some of my rips. And now, you are suggesting to spend _more time _with him?"

Dez broke into tears and warped his arms around her midsection. "Please! Help us!"

Ally tried to step out of the circle of Dez' arms. She clearly didn't want him in her personal space. "This is a preposterous offer!" she argued, fighting against Dez' desperation clad ironly around her. "I'm not moving in with a stranger! He could be anything! He could be a pervert, an illiterate, or even worse, he could eat marshmallows for breakfast!"

"Hey!" Austin pouted.

"No offense," the girl told him, then turned toward Trish and Dez again. "There is no way I'm going to do this!" She stepped out of Dez's circle of craziness and threatened him with a brandished index finger, when he tried to rain desperation on her again. "Personal space, you!"

"It's a huge house! You'll barely meet!" Trish tried to argue.

Austin stepped between her and Ally. "She doesn't want to go!"

Trish tried to push Austin out of the way. "With a dozen bedrooms and more bathrooms than you can imagine!"

Austin pulled at Trish's elbow. "And I don't want her to move in with me!"

She tried to jerk her arm away, casting him a withering glance. "You'll have every music instrument you want!"

"Don't I have a say in this?" Austin inquired.

Trish ignored him. "Just think about your son!" she finally argued.

Ally, on her way to the exit, froze at the words. Her thoughts were jumbled in a thousand different pieces. They were right, of course. What about Denny? She needed every penny for him. Even if not for herself, Denny's education needed the money. And Denny needed to be removed from Mr. Dawson's shop.

Ally loved her father, but he set a bad example for just about everything - he was irresponsible, left whenever it pleased him and paid Ally irregularly.

Ally halfway didn't notice that Trish pushed a small piece of paper into her hand. "And, by the way, your initial salary," she said conspiratorially.

Ally stole a glance at the piece of paper. Her eyes almost fell out of her skull. She was quite certain that she looked like Munch's "The Scream". The number was - never in her wildest dreams she would have expected to be paid that sum.

She turned toward Trish and waved with the piece of paper. "Seriously?"

"Why?" Dez asked. "No enough?"

"_Dez!_" Trish elbowed him into silence, glaring at him. When she looked at Ally, her smile was sweet and kind. "Look, sweetheart, we _really _need a songwriter that can handle him. I realize he can be quite a handful, since he's chaotic, not the brightest and has an ill-conceived fascination with plush animals."

"Hey, I can _hear _you!" Austin called. "And my plush animals are my _friends_! You hurt their feelings!"

"But we need you," Trish continued with a sideways glare to Austin. "And it will be for only one album?"

Ally looked at him. Dez and Trish seemed genuinely desperate, but Austin looked away and sulked, sticking his lower lip out. He still clutched the sheet of paper with his awful lyrics to his heart.

Only one album. Only one album? One album was enought - afterwards she would be a nervous wreck, she knew, but she needed the money. And Denny needed safety.

So she sighed and said: "Yes."

"Yes?" Trish asked, elated. "Yes, yes?"

"Yes," Ally said and this time, it was difficult not to be infected by Trish's sheer joy. She received to hugs and another pout from Austin, then a contract was shoved into her hands.

"We'll send a copy to your lawyer, of course, this one's for you," Trish said. She shook Ally's hand vigorously. "Welcome to De La Rosa Entertainment."

Dez dove in for another hug, but this time was stopped by Ally's glare. "No. More. Hugs," she admonished him and he shook her hand with the face of a puppy that had just been beaten.

"And you," Trish continued, this time addressing Austin. "You will be nice. We are doing this for your career. _She _is doing this for your career."

"I knooowww," the singer moaned. "But still, I'm not sure I'm ready to write more songs and go on tour. I'm just so … so …"

"Sad?" Dez guessed.

"Yes! How do you know?"

"Lucky guess," Dez answered.

Two days later, a huge van appeared at Ally's house. A group of four men, each built like a Chippendale, emerged from it and addressed Ally as "ma'am" and got all her boxes into the car. After they left, literally moments later, a huge limo appeared in front of Ally's house.

She told her father goodbye - the house was plastered with hundreds of little post-its with advice on them, ensuring the older man's survival. Ally was sure his father would manage to loose them all. Denny was excited and overwhelmed at the prospect of living with a popstar, while Ally's mood was dimmed.

She wasn't sure what was expected of her - she had to write songs with him, but what if he just wasn't willing?

"How big is his house, mom?" Denny asked.

She ruffled the small boy's hair. "Really big."

"Big enough to play soccer inside?" he asked. "Just theoretically," he quickly added when Ally was about to add a rule called "There's no playing soccer in the house."

"Probably," Ally said. "Don't worry, you'll like it."

"Okay," Denny said and for him, everything was good.

Ally still wasn't able to fight the feeling of gooey nervousness in her stomach.

end (2/?)

Note: **AuRauraxxSparks** reviewed and asked if Ally is 40. Noooo - and I realize how this assumption came to be: Her son seems like he fourty, because he acts older than his age. Ally's around 23 or 24, as is Austin.


	3. Boxershorts & Blue Towels

Title: Night and Day (3/?)  
Genre: dramatic romcom, AU  
Rating: currently T, M for later chapters  
Couple: Austin/Ally  
Summary: Austin Moon is the world's most famous rockstar and due to heartbreak completely out of control. So his agency brings in songwriter Ally Dawson, who is as brilliant as she is desperate. She needs a job - and what she gets is Austin Moon's crazy everyday life.

Chapter 3 - Boxershorts & Blue Towels

Austin Moon's house wasn't just big. It was _enormous. _Ally was sure that the electrical bills were on par with the annual budget of some Third World Countries.

It was bright and spacious with many windows, two pools, several terraces and porticoes and it had a wide garden. It was almost _too _big to live alone in it.

Austin didn't live alone, as Ally was quick to find out. The Chippendale guys moved the boxes inside and someone just _had _to squeeze in between them, brushing all of them in a way that made Ally blush.

"Oh, hello," a blonde woman purred. "I'm so sorry, oops, oh my." The Chippendale movers ignored her and cast her some polite smiles. They seemed to be used to this kind of occurrence.

The blond woman approached Ally and her son. She carried a small, pocket-sized dog in one hand and a glass of a dark green transparent fluid in her other. Leaning forward, she kissed the unassuming Ally on both cheeks.

"I'm Mimi Moon," she said. "Austin's mother. You must be Ally."

"Ah, yes," Ally said, pressing her son Denny against her. "I am. Nice to meet you, Mrs. Moon."

"Oh, call me Mimi," Mrs. Moon said. "Welcome to the castle." She laughed heartily, then bend down to address Denny. "And who is this little guy?"

"My son Denny," Ally said. "Say hello, Denny."

"Hello," Denny said and gently shook Mrs. Moon's hand.

Mrs. Moon laughed, clearly flattered. "Oh, so well mannered. Then I'll introduce to you someone too. This is Merlot." She indicated to the small dog and made him wave with his paw. "Say hello, Merlot."

Merlot didn't want to say hello. Merlot was mostly unnerved by being carried around all day.

"Is he named after the Multimedia Educational Resource for Learning and Online Teaching Programm, a program of the California State University in partnership with higher education institutions, professional societies, and industry?" Denny asked, very politely.

Ally almost face-palmed herself. She loved her son to death, but for strangers it took some time to get accustomed to him.

Mrs. Moon, however, didn't even blink. "No," she said. "We were thinking about naming him after that, but then went for the wine grape."

There was a moment between the three of them where Denny smiled happily, Ally just gaped and Mrs. Moon winked at the songwriter. Then Mrs. Moon said:

"C'mon in, I'll show you around." And she whooshed toward the house, her long feathery satin gown floating behind her like a cloud.

"I like her," Denny whispered at his mother.

"I find her creepy," Ally whispered back.

"Mom," Denny whispered. "You find everyone creepy."

The house was as bright and spacious on the inside was it was on the outside. In the lobby was a baby grande situated in front of a huge wall of glass, guitars where in every corner of the room and the walls were decorated with a mixture of modern art and frames that contained golden and platinum records.

A grand staircase on the right side lead to the second floor and Ally could hear faint music coming from up here.

"Austin's sulking," Mimi Moon explained. "Don't expect him to come down before six and don't expect him to be sober. Or showered at that."

"_Ew_!" Ally said. She remembered the small post-it on her contract confirmation with De La Rosa Entertainment. It had been from Trish herself.

"Make him write music by _any means necessary_." That's what the Latino girl had ordered her to do. She looked down at Denny who stared at the house with huge eyes.

Something upstairs broke and somebody cursed.

Mrs. Moon cast the second floor a worried glance, then ushered Ally on. "Come, come."

As it turned out, Ally wasn't going to live in the house, but in the pool house next to Austin Moon's mansion. It was nice and cozy and clean and Ally didn't have to fear to go on an expedition and pack several rations of food it she just tried to find her son.

There was a kitchen that had never been used, a pool that had constantly been cleaned and a room filled with a piano grand and a wonderful view into the garden. What else could she wish for?

"Do you like it?" Mrs. Moon asked.

"I love it," Ally said. It was difficult not to.

Mimi Moon smiled. "Well, then, welcome to the mansion. We hope you and Austin will work well together. How about dinner at our house tonight?"

"Do you live with Austin?" Ally asked. "Because I'm not sure if he would be happy if I intruded -"

"Oh, no, we are actually Austin's neighbours," Mrs. Moon said. "Just follow the yellow brick road in the garden and come to our kingdom." Her voice had taken on a booming quality at the last words. Then she winked again and was gone.

"Alright, she _is _creepy," Denny said, when Mrs. Moon had left the house.

"Told you." Ally looked around at the boxes. The kitchen equipment boxes were in the kitchen, her own were in her bed room and Denny's had been brought to his room. "We need to unpack."

The sound of breaking glass interrupted their conversation, then the sound of splashing water. Ally took a look out of the window to understand what had happened.

"Why don't you go and unpack your stuff? I'll be right back," she told her son.

"Okay," Denny answered, shot her a last glance, then skipped toward his room.

Ally carefully opened the door to the veranda. Only a stripe of grass, a few lawn chair and the pool in between separated her new home from the huge mansion that belonged to Austin. On the second floor of the mansion was a balcony with opened doors. Ally suspected Austin's bedroom to be up there. Attached to the balcony was a long flag pole and on it, patrioticly and proudly, waved a pair of boxer shorts with trucks printed on them.

Ally lowered her glance a bit - and even a bit more - to see a mob of blond hair stick out of the water. As a matter of fact, she only saw the hair, two huge, wide eyes and the nose. Everything else was underwater.

Ally sighed, crossed her arms over her chest and stepped to the pool's edge.

"Hello," she said.

Austin dove out of the water just enough so he could speak. "Hello."

"Are you drunk?" Ally asked.

It took Austin just a _wee _bit too long to answer and his voice sounded a tiny bit too pitiful. "No."

"And did you jump off the balcony?"

"No?" Austin said and off Ally's questioning look, he cleared his voice and answered with a steady, yet oddly croaking "No."

"And did you loose your boxer shorts in the process?" Ally continued to inquire.

"No …" He said hesitantly. Then he cleared his voice again. "I mean: No. That's the flag of moon country up there. It's always there, you know?" He paused, then continued in a whiney voice. "Could you maybe just go away?"

"You drank, you jumped off your balcony into the pool and lost your unmentionables?" Ally asked, her voice sharp.

Austin, in the water, chuckled. "Unmentionables?"

"That's the most irresponsible thing ever!" She threatened him with her index finger. "Look, I'm hired to write songs with you and I really don't care what you spend your time with, but I have a son and if something would have happened to you, he would have seen a dead or bleeding person on his first day here! And do you want to be responsible for a young child's nightmares? Will you pay his psychiatrist? Will you visit him in Gangster Camp, or worse, Boxing Camp, when he wears baggy jeans, gets himself a tattoo and tries to marry Paris Hilton?"

"Uhm, mom?"

Ally turned, her sharp voice immediately like honey. "Yes, Denny?"

He handed her a blue towel. "That's for him. In case he wants to come out there and save his dignity."

Ally sighed, used to being around Denny, but Austin's surprise was palpable. "Thanks, buddy."

"You are welcome, Mr. Moon," Denny said. He pointed back at the house. "I'll go back inside. I'm not allowed around drunk strangers. Good night."

"Good night," Austin said.

"'Night, Denny."

Ally made ushering motions with his hands and the boy disappeared in the house again. Austin had swam closer to edge and tried to grasp the towel, but Ally lifted her arm.

"Do you remember what I said earlier?" she asked.

"That I'm not supposed to kill myself when your son is around," Austin said, rolling his eyes.

"Good." She handed him the towel and turned around to wait for him to get out of the swimming pool. She heard the soft noises of fabric being unfolded and then the solid, wet presence of someone standing behind her way too close.

"You know that I would have come out of the pool, with or without my 'unmentionables', but your son was already hiding behind one of the balcony pillars and I didn't want _him _to see." She felt him chuckle behind her.

Ally managed to keep her sharp and business-like tone of voice. "You reek of alcohol and chlorine," she said, turning toward him. Unfazed by his proximity, she took him by the shoulders, turned him toward the mansion and pushed him forward. "You are going to shower. Now. And preferably shave. And then we talk about my job."

Austin let himself be pushed toward the entrance of the mansion. "You just got hit on by the world's greatest popstar. You could have at least blushed!" He turned and raised his eyebrows at her accusingly.

_God, how big can this guy's ego be?_

"If I blush, will you shower extra thoroughly and," she sniffed at him. "Use some deodorant?"

"I smell summery and breezily!" he argued, lifted his arm and pointed for her to smell.

"Ew, no thanks. And no, you don't," Ally said. She pinched her cheeks. "There. I blush. Now, you go and shower?"

"Will you come too?" he asked, switching back to flirting. He leaned forward, smiled dazzlingly at her and waggled his eyebrows.

She pushed him away with her index finger poking his chest. "Another person in the shower cabin would disrupt my shower routine, so thanks, but no thanks."

"What's your shower routine?" Austin asked, as he was pushed toward the giant living room of his house.

"First soap in your front side, then your backside, then soak a bit and while you do so, you can start putting lotion on your hair. Then shower off, but not the shampoo and soak in a second time. Then -"

"Alright, alright, I'll shower. Why are you pushing me toward the fireplace room? My bathroom is upstairs!"

"I don't know your house! Just go shower!" she said. "And brush your teeth!"

Austin threw a glance over her shoulder at her, then stumbled toward, what was presumably, the bathroom. He stopped, turned toward Ally and said: "What's your name again?"

"I have already told you. Dez and Trish have already told you."

"Tell me again."

"Ally. Ally Dawson," she said. "And your towel starts to slip."

"Yeah." Austin didn't seem to notice. He was deep in thought and most of his thoughts centered around her. "You want to know why all my other songwriters left?"

"No, not really."

"They couldn't keep up with me. With my character, my craziness, the fact that I eat marshmallows for breakfast."

_I knew it, _Ally thought.

"But you, you seem to be a challenge," Austin concluded. "You don't even blush, do you?" He let the towel slowly slip to the floor.

Ally kept her eyes firmly trained on his. "I'm not easily shaken."

"I believe you are, though. You are a goody two-shoes, I know your kind. You _are _easily flustered, because your pupils are dilating," Austin said.

Ally tried to be indignant about this. She _was _easily flustered and had this happened during her teenager years, she would have started to stutter and stand in a really awkward way, but now, she was a _professional, _for God's sake, so she would act _professionally._

So she did the only reasonable thing she could think of. She rummaged in her pocket and said: "Oh, what's this?"

And then a flash blinded Austin. The flash from her cell phone's digital cam.

"TMZ will be so delighted," she said. She moved her hands to paint an imaginary billboard into the air. Her eyes surveyed it with a faraway look. "I can already see the headline: _Austin Moon - now you can compare._"

Austin picked up his towel in a hurry. "Are you _out of your mind_?"

"And if that doesn't work, I will sneak into your room at night, steal your plush animals and do unspeakable things to them," she said.

Austin's jaw hit the floor. "What?! You are crazy! I'll phone Trish and have you fired!"

"You were the one that stripped in front of me," Ally said. "And I have proof. Look," she quickly interrupted him before he could say something. "I'm easy to work with and I really need this job, not for me, but for Denny. And I can't get flustered, because frankly, I am blushing to my hair roots and would escape this room, screaming. But Denny needs this, so I can only beg of you to make this as easy and comfortable for the two of us as possible. And please don't strip in front of me. I barely know you!"

Austin stared at her. Then stared some more, the towel pressed to his groin. Then he said: "I'll go showering."

Ally just nodded, sat down on one of his enormous living room couches and waited.

"Yeah," Austin said, still befuddled, watching her sit there. "Showering. Now."

He disappeared upstairs, found the bathroom and entered it. He closed the door behind him and leaned against it. Taking a deep breath, he said:

"Ally Dawson. Ally _Dawson." What had just happened?_

He looked at himself in the mirror. He still looked good, if you liked the caveman kind of style. And he hadn't shaved the last three days. And she actually send him away like a little boy.

This was not acceptable. Who the hell was that girl Trish and Dez had hired? She was like his mom. No. She was _worse _then his mom. She had to go. Austin didn't want her to be here. He didn't want anyone to be here.

He took his razor out and cheked the blade. His hands shook slightly and the unavoidable happened. "Damn!" he hissed, as blood dripped into the sink.

"Are you alright?" he could hear Ally call out for him.

"Yeah," he managed. "Just peachy."

_Just you wait, Ally Dawson._

_Just you wait._

(3/?)

Oy, you. **Thanks for reviewing everyone.** However, I was a bit flabberghasted that I got 134 views for chapter two alone and just seven reviewers. Kudos to those who reviewed, but it would be really great if I get **at least ten reviews for each chapter**. I'm not one of these authors who gets greedy and wants more reviews with each chapter, but since this story is going to be really long, ten reviews per chapter would be really, really awesome. In a way, reviews are the only thing that informs us authors if you hate or like the story, so please drop a note.

**queenc1:** Hope that answers your question. :) Thanks for reviewing.  
**Anonymous Number #1:** Denny's seven years old (as mentioned in chapter one) and we'll soon see who the dad is. Ally was kind of a young mom.  
**OhSnapItzCari:** Here's your update! :) Thanks for reviewing.  
**Awesomesauce325:** Thanks a lot.  
**Anonymous Number #2:** Here you go.  
**bookworm3:** Thanks a lot. The idea was how Austin would be if he had never met Ally, so he's a bit of ... an airhead in this one. Hope you continue liking it.  
** .7524879:** Here you go. :)


	4. Electric Pink & Unicorns On Ice

Title: Night and Day (4/?)  
Genre: dramatic romcom, AU  
Rating: currently T, M for later chapters  
Couple: Austin/Ally  
Summary: Austin Moon is the world's most famous rockstar and due to heartbreak completely out of control. So his agency brings in songwriter Ally Dawson, who is as brilliant as she is desperate. She needs a job - and what she gets is Austin Moon's crazy everyday life.  
Note: Sorry this took so long. It's a lengthy chapter. I hope you like it.

Chapter 4 - Electric Pink & Unicorns On Ice

Ally found her new surroundings confusing. It was like living away from the world in a beautiful garden. It was so quiet, so perfect, so very much away from all that was bad in the world. Denny loved it - it was the kind of stability he needed and as for Ally …

Inspiration seemed to attack her from everywhere. Sometimes, she woke in the night and instantly words came floating toward her and she had to write them down. Her songwriting book sat next to her lamp on the nightstand whenever she needed it.

It was half past three when her eyes opened and an idea struck her. She had been toying with it all day, but the lyrics still didn't fit.

"When the crowd wants more I bring on the thunder," she sang softly. She sat up and swung her legs out of the bed and got up. "Cause you got my back and I'm not going under."

On the way to her fridge she wondered what would rhyme well to "chord" - and while she hummed the words, she opened the fridge and took out the glass of pickles. Grasping a fork, the mumbled: "Lord? Hoard? Board?" _Board. _"But what kind of board? Blackboard? Billboard?"

It was billboard that finally stuck. Sliding the door open to the veranda, she struggled to carry her book, the jar of pickles and the fork, while finally aiming for one of the lawn chairs in the moon-lit garden.

The pool sparkled in the quietness of the night and she looked up to find the pair of boxers to wave as quietly on the pole attached to Austin's balcony. She could see faint light up there and a rope ladder leading down from the balcony.

For a moment, she was wide awake as thoughts of burglars and alphabet bandits entered their mind. Then she noticed a figure laying in one of the lawn chairs just on the other side of the pool. Austin slept there, still clothed in something he had apparently worn on his night out. He had brought his glasses with them - they sat slightly askew on his nose. A beer bottle also glistened in the darkness next to his lawn chair.

She placed down her book, the jar and the fork and rounded the pool. She picked up one of the towels from the wooden box by the umbrellas and approached him.

He snored slightly, his hands under his head as a pillow. The position didn't look overly comfortable and Ally wondered why he would sleep out here, in the darkness, when he had a cozy bedroom just one balcony-with-waving-boxer-shorts away.

Sighing, Ally spread the towel over his sleeping form and removed his second shoe. The first one swam happily in the pool.

"No good deed goes unpunished," she thought bitterly. He wasn't exactly nice to her and it was still beyond her why she cared.

Austin turned to his side and mumbled uneasily in his sleep. He punched the lawn chair under him twice, then clawed it desperately.

"Don't go away," he mumbled. "Please stay! Don't leave me alone!"

Ally picked up the towel and stuffed it under his body. He calmed a bit, turned again and drifted away.

"The reason for the sad songs," she whispered, then went back to her glass of pickles, her fork and her book. "Billboards," she murmured. "And what now?"

"A _pink _guitar?" Mr. Dawson asked. He tried hard not to roll his eyes. What an outrageous wish! "We have paprika red guitars, angel kiss colored guitars, cosmic latte colored guitars and Boston blue colored guitars, but who wants a pink guitar? Tsk!" He shook his head.

The costumer was slightly bemused. In his opinion, he held a guitar in his hands that was completely, utterly, perfectly pink. "Erm, what kind of color is this then? Isn't it pink?" He pointed at a guitar that looked _just pink._

Mr. Dawson almost reacted shocked. "No! That's _cerise_! That's something completely different!"

The costumer sighed. "Then, I pink this _cerise _kind of guitar, sir."

Mr. Dawson cast him a dark glance. If that guy didn't even know the right color of those instruments, would they treat their instruments well? But nonetheless, he packed the guitar for the man and send him off.

Today was a good day. Lots of costumers, two sold tubas and one trumpet and half a dozen other instruments. Mr. Dawson had feared that interest would die down somewhat, due to Ally's absence. Some people, mostly guys, had come just to see her and she had politely shot them down and sold them whatever they wanted. There had been some disappointment since her departure, of course, but people still came pouring in.

After all, Mr. Dawson was something of an institution.

"Hi."

Mr. Dawson turned around. "Hello, valued costumer." He smiled. "How may I help you?"

The other person was a blond man, quite good looking, the surfer kind of guy. His smile was bright as he approached Mr. Dawson, but Ally's father couldn't see the man's eyes. They were hidden behind a huge pair of sunglasses. Mr. Dawson wondered why someone would wear sunglasses in a closed room. Were the lights too bright? Mr. Dawson wondered if that was something he had to fix today.

Somehow the man looked familiar - _very _familiar, but Mr. Dawson just couldn't place him.

"I'm looking for a guitar," the young man said. "A Gibson, maybe? ES-345?"

A young man with a _very _expensive taste. "Oh, you have a good taste, but those guitars are rarely bought around here. I'll have to order them, if you want one."

"I see," the man said. He looked around. "Then I try one of those." He picked up one of Mr. Dawson's acoustic guitars and tried to chords. "That color is electric crimson, isn't it?"

"Yes!" Mr. Dawson pointed. "Yes, it is! Someone finally got it right." He bend closer conspirationally and whispered: "Can you imagine someone mistook it for raspberry?" He shook is head. "Unbelievable!"

"Yes, especially since it's _so _obviously electric crimson," the young man said.

"I know!" Mr. Dawson answered. "So you play the guitar?"

For a moment, the blond guy seemed surprised, but the notion disappeared quickly and an easy smile appeared on his face. "Yes, I play a bit." He hit another chord and then hit a couple of strings. He had some skills, Mr. Dawson noticed. "That one sounds quite good. I think I take it." Then he looked around. "Where's the girl that used to work around here?"

"Girl?" Mr. Dawson asked.

"Yeah, the brunette. Small, spunky." _Talks too much._

"Oh, you mean Ally? She used to work here, but now she's working for some kind of popstar. She's a songwriter, you know?" Mr. Dawson said. That guy _did_ look familiar. And, really, why _did_ he wear sunglasses in a closed room? "How do you know her?"

"I talked to her once of twice," the young man said. "She's a songwriter, huh? So she sings, too?"

"And plays the piano and the guitar and has some really weird dance moves, yes," Mr. Dawson said, his hands trailing the guitars. He seemed to miss her. "She is a lot like her mother."

"I see." The stranger accompanied Mr. Dawson to the counter to pay. "Why doesn't she sing herself? I mean, if she plays instruments, writes her own songs and can sing?"

"Oh. She has horrible stage fright," Mr. Dawson said, typing in the price of the guitar. The cash register ringed. "She can't perform, so she writes." He shrugged. "Has been that way since she was thirteen or so." He shrugged.

"I see," the blond man said, now with more conviction. "You don't need to wrap it, it's alright, thank you."

Mr. Dawson took the man's money, wrapped the guitar and was mostly happy about the purchase and that somebody had identified the color as crimson electric. A part of his brain wondered however:

_Where had he seen that guy before?_

Austin's car rolled up the huge drive way. The garage door lifted up and he let it roll inside. Carefully, he slipped out of the car and removed the object from the passenger seat. Then he opened the door that lead toward the house and listened.

He could hear faint piano tunes in the distance. So she was in the recording room, practicing, composing. She was occupied. Maybe it was possible to sneak just past her toward the second floor and ditch today's composing session.

He shouldered the thing and sneaked up the stairs and opened the door toward the mansion. The living room seemed empty. And there was still music in the distance. She was still playing.

He ducked a bit and, on tiptoes, made his way toward the staircase. Still music playing. She wouldn't make it out to catch him. He was save.

"Austin?"

He froze and turned on the ball of his foot. Ally stood by the fridge, a milk beard surrounding her lips. In her hand, she held a half-empty glass.

"What are you doing?" she asked. Then she motioned toward the object on his back. "Is that an electric pink guitar?"

"Yes," he said slowly. His thoughts raced. How was he going to get out of this situation? "Why aren't you in the recording room?"

"Oh, I'm currently listening to what I wrote this morning," her voice grew darker. "When the two of us were supposed to practice together."

"Oh, that was today?" he asked. "I had an appointment - with my dentist."

"And that's why you are carrying a guitar?" she asked. "What do you need it for?"

"He gave it to me?" he said in a small voice. Then, he cleared his throat and said, more convincingly: "He gave it to me. Yes. My dentist. This morning. It's for me, because … fans give me stuff all the time."

Ally stared at him. She didn't look that convinced, but let it go. "Want to hear what I wrote today?" she asked.

There was a long moment where Austin was almost said "No", but then he just sighed. "Sure," he said and was immediately dragged away.

She had recorded _ninety-three _minutes worth of material. Pieces of paper were all over the piano with notes and lyrics written over them. She had been a busy girl.

"What is all of this?" he asked and picked up a piece of paper. _The tears of your sadness_, was all he was able to read, then she snatched it away.

"I was trying to find your style - or synchronize myself with it," she said. "But it's kinda difficult, if the person who is going to sing the song isn't here, so I listened to your old albums and tried to come up with something."

_Good, she _was _a goody two-shoes. Did the girl have any hobbies?_

Austin knew he was going to regret his next words: "So show me then."

And she did. Everything. Songs about heart break, songs about no heartbreak. Ballads, rap passages, jazzy jingles, poppy jingles, rocky jingles. refrains for half a dozen unfinished songs, several bridges, twenty one pages of lyrics, some of them so bloody sensitive, Austin thought he was going to loose all his manliness by just looking at them. They were horrible.

Ally, however, wasn't stopped by his total lack of enthusiasm. "And I thought, here it would go kinda like this." She touched some piano keys and started to slowly sing:

"_It's like I'm balanced on the edge_  
_It's like I'm hanging by a thread_  
_But I'm still gonna push ahead."_

She looked up at Austin who stood by the window. "What do you think?"

"I think it's nice," he said.

"Just nice?"

"Yeah, it's _nice_," he said. For a moment, he got caught: "I like the lyrics, but I can't sing that as a ballad, it should be faster. And with a more prominent beat, so you can, I don't know, clap to it." He sat next to her and touched some keys, indicating another, faster beat.

His eyes froze on the piano keys and slowly, he removed his hands. He shook his head and was about to get up, but Ally grapped his arm and made him sit down again.

"Why don't you like writing music anymore?" Ally asked. "I listened to some of your old songs and they were very energetic."

He looked at her, opened his mouth to say something, but then stood and moved quickly to the window. When he turned, his smile was mischievous. "I'm going to host a party tonight. You should come."

"A party?" Ally was surprised at the sudden change of topic. "But I really need to work some more. We only have eight months for an entire album and you haven't even begun to give me input."

"Here's some input," he said. "You need to get to know me to write songs for me. I like to go to parties. Lots of my friends will be there too. It will help you understand me better."

"I really don't do parties much."

"You should," Austin said. "All the important people will be there. Folks from my lanel, some stars, Dez, Trish. It's good to mingle."

"And I don't _mingle_," Ally said, her voice crisp.

"Why? Is there a rule against mingling?"

"Look, Austin, it's really nice of you to invite me, but I'm really not a party animal. Lots of people, lots of alcohol, people being loud and talking and somebody asking you to dance and their sweaty hands around yours - _ew! _No, thanks."

"But I can't show up there without my new songwriter," Austin argued. "People want to meet you. It's business."

"Austin …"

"Please? Please, please, please, _please_?" he whined, giving her his best puppy impression.

She considered him for a moment, then sighed. He was right, of course. She needed to get to know him better. "Alright, fine." But her threatening index finger was immediately in his face. "But I won't stay until after midnight. Got it?"

She was already out of the room, when he said: "Got it," and rubbed his hands, grinning mischievously.

Ally left Denny with his grandfather for the evening. Mr. Dawson was happy to see his grandson again and vice versa. Plus, even though she wouldn't admit it, she was glad to have an evening off being a mom. Denny was the easiest child ever, but his presence came - naturally - with a constant feeling of worry; and though that hadn't diminished completely, it had descreased a bit.

She couldn't remember when she had been out for the last time.

That evening, when she left the pool house for the garden, the preparations for Austin Moon's party were in full swing.

Ice sculptures of Austin Moon were everywhere in the garden and a small stage had been built. Austin was probably going to sing. Fake marble pillars were placed around the stage to hold up the lightning - and the band was about to set up their instruments.

Most guests had not arrived yet, but a blond girl in a shrill, pink dress shot through the garden and the house and photographed _everything._

"Hi," Ally greeted her. "Are you the interior designer? May I help you?"

The girl turned around sharply and her left eye trembled slightly. "No," she said and the word was long-drawn and sharp, spoken with a kind of urgency that Ally found slightly disconcerting. "I am _not _the interior designer."

"Are you one of the press people?" Ally asked, already regretting this conversation.

"No," she snapped. "I'm not," she raised her fingers to indicate a quote: "'one of the press people'. I'm Tilly Thompson. I'm president of Austin Moon's fanclub and his number one fan."

"I see," Ally said. Her good manners prevented her from fleeing. "I'm -"

"I know who you are," she said sharply and stepped a bit too close to Ally. She ducked away. "You are Ally Dawson, his new songwriter and currently the only eligible female living around Austin Moon."

"Eligible?" Ally echoed. "What exactly are you -?"

"But you will never have him," Tilly Thompson screeched with wide open eyes. "Because Austin Moon is mine! Mine! Mine!" And she tumbled away, leaving Ally standing by a Cupid ice sculpture.

"Yeahh," she said slowly. Definitely an encounter of the third kind.

If all of Austin's friends were like this, this was going to be a short night.

Dez was there - he had brought some of his own ice sculptures. And while they were technically absolutely brilliant, Ally found Dez had used a bit too much of his overactive imagination. One, for example, featured Austin in a gladiator's armor, sitting on a unicorn. It looked very life like - it was the only thing good Ally managed to say about it.

"You came!"

Ally turned at Trish's voice and was promptly caught in a huge hug.

"And you look beautiful." It sounded vaguely surprised.

"Thanks," Ally said. "I tried. So, who is going to be here this evening?"

"Ralphie Hayes, for example!" Trish said. She pointed over at a table where a young man examined the huge pyramid of water melons. He seemed to be quite fascinated with them. "Oh, he so dreamy."

Ally examined him and tilted her head. Except for the wild, dark, palm tree-like hair, he looked a lot like … "He looks a bit like Austin, doesn't he?"

"Ralphie Hayes?" Trish spluttered. "Nooo. They don't look anything alike. Austin's blond."

"Yes, but besides the hair color …," but Trish wasn't listening anymore. She waved at some unknown person in the growing croud. "JStar, my friend! It's TriRosa! How are you doing?" She turned to Ally. "See you later, AlDaw. I need to go and mingle."

"Yeah, right." She watched as Trish disappeared among the people. Despite suddenly being surrounded by people, Ally was struck by a sense of loneliness. She didn't know anyone here, while everyone else seemed to be surrounded by their best friends. For a moment, she considered approaching someone, but there only seemed to be groups of people around.

She spotted Dez' red hair several times in the crowd and Trish wandered around, talking to this or to that person, but they seemed to busy.

So in the end, she took a glass of champagne, wandered over to one of the many palm trees and watched the group of Hawaiian dancers Austin had hired blow huge clouds of fire.

Somebody tapped her on the shoulder. "Hi."

She turned and was surprised to see Ralphie Hayes standing there. He smiled. "I don't know anyone here either. Are friends with Austin Moon?"

_Thank God, a sympathetic soul. _"Ah, no. Not exactly. I'm his new songwriter."

Ralphie Hayes' eyes widened. "Oh my God, that's _you_? I've heard about you! You wrote _The Greatest Love Song_! That was an amazing song!"

"Thanks a lot."

Ralphie Hayes seemed to be almost euphoric. "That I would meet you here. Hey, listen." He leaned closer. "If they treat you badly here, you are always welcome to work as a composer or sound designer at my new movie. I'm quite sure I can pull a few strings here."

"Thank you very much, but I am going to honor this commitment," she said. "It's nice of you to offer, though."

Ralphie Hayes grinned. "For a composer of your calibre, always. Just think about it, alright?"

"I will."

At the stage, the spotlights started to dance. The pillars surrounding the stage seemed to glitter. Someone played a drum roll and finally, Austin climbed the stairs and grasped the microphone.

"Hi, I'm Austin Moon! Welcome to my party!"

The crowd cheered and clapped, some raised their drinks. Even more people poured into the garden. Search light danced the sky.

Ally tried very hard not to be impressed, but it was a feat not easily achieved.

"Alright! Let's kick this off!" Austin roared into the microphone. Somewhere in the back, pyrotechnics went off.

The drums started the entry beat and the other band members joined in.

"Isn't he dreamy?" Tilly Thompson sighed.

Ally almost jumped Ralphie at the girl's sudden appearance next to her. Her heart beat calmed and she shuffled a bit away from the girl. "Yeah," she said. "Dreamy." Though _dreamy _wasn't the word Ally would use to describe a guy. She had to admit, however, that Austin knew how to rock the house. He had amazing stage presence and was a fantastic dancer.

People loved him.

Ally clapped along - and caught Trish's gaze across the garden.

Trish nodded over at Austin and raised her eyebrows. "Well?" was her silent question.

Ally sighed, smiled and nodded. "Good," she mouthed back at Trish with a cheesy thumbs up.

"Toldja," Trish winked.

The song ended and Austin stood there, his chest heaving, his face aglow, frozen in his trademark crossed-arms pose. His positively bathed in the crowd's response. His adrenaline seemed to bounce off him at his audience - and returned to him, tenfold. He could magnetically draw them with him, could pull them to their feet and dance and cheer at him.

"Thanks a ton," Austin said, after his first performance. "As some of you might knw, I'm working on a new album."

_Ohhs _and _Ahhs _echoed, people grinned and clapped and called out for him. "And may lable - thank you, Dez, thanks, Trish - was kind enough to provide me with a new songwriter." Suddenly it struck Ally like called rain when she realized where this was going. "Please give a hand for my new songwriter, Ally Dawson."

The poeple cheered and craned their necks to see her. Ralphie Hayes smiled and pushed her with a lot of good intentions toward the stage, whistling through his finger and pointing to her.

Alle knew he meant well, but suddenly she felt nauseous. Her hands started to sweat and tremble, as she was pushed through the crowd and toward Austin's smiling face.

He pulled her up on stage and she only saw manically smiling people and bright, blinding lights. Austin stood next to her and she was tempted to cling to him. However, he felt sweaty - and Ally didn't really know him and she hated to touch strangers, so she just stood there, frozen to a pillar. She winked mechanically at people and desperately analyzed the situation for the next exit.

"I thought we might convince Ally to play a little something for us," Austin said.

Ally heard the words, but couldn't react. She couldn't say anything, she just wanted to gnaw on her hair and run for the hills. There were laughing people, screaming people, madly clapping people everywhere. And suddenly, it was so hot in here, the sounds to deafening and her clothes so sweaty.

Her throat started to tighten up - she couldn't breath anymore, she needed to get out of there, but Austin held her arm.

"A-Austin," she half-whispered, half-croaked. "I can't. I have horrible stage fright."

He didn't seem to take her seriously. "Oh, c'mon, just one little song. The audience wants it, can't you hear?" He held a hand to his ear as if she couldn't understand the maddening chorus:

"Ally! Ally! Ally!"

Ally's panic started to gain momentum. "Austin, I really can't! I -," she struggled for breath. Her throat was so tight!

_I need to get out of here._

She tried to push him away, but she held her in an iron-clad grasp.

"Ally, c'mon …"

"You need to let me go!" Reality started to twist and rotate. Ally tried to put her hand on her ears, but he was just too strong.

"Ally?" His mischievous grin started to fade as he began to realize that something was wrong with her.

His hold on her started to loosen und that was a mistake. She pushed him away and like in slow motion, his arms flailed out and he fell backwards. The collision with one of the pillars next to the stage was like in a bad comedy movie: The pillar tilted slowly and fell into the next, which in turn crashed into its neighbour.

All nine pillars fell over and the last proceeded to fall into the table with the buffet atop of it - right into the water melon pyramid Ralphie Hayes had liked so much.

The water melons burst away like cannon balls into all four directions.

One tipped over the ice sculpture of Austin on the unicorn. In between Dez' screaming, the unicorn crashed into the pool. Other melons collided with the champagne pyramid, chased the man holding the Austin Moon balloons and made the fire-breather swallow his fire.

He gulped heavily, then burped an enormous flame. It set one of the palm trees aflame.

A twig on fire fell into the firework tent - which went up immediately - among chaos and big explosions.

And people started to run and scream.

Austin just stared, surprised, shocked and kind of amused, but Ally was beyond panic and terror.

She just stared at what she had done - and followed the general opinion of panicking party guests and ran away, too.

"Ally!" Austin called, but she didn't hear him - she didn't _want _to hear him. "Ally!"

She turned once and looked over her shoulder, before she disappeared in the garden. He could see her tears. She cried. He had made her cry.

Dez had dived into the pool to save his unicorn, while Trish called the fire department.

For a moment, Austin considered staying and waiting until the fire fights arrived, but then he decided otherwise. Trish would handle it, she always did.

So he followed Ally, presumably into the pool house.

He wondered: Had he overdone it? Another palm caught fire and small explosions destroyed the music equipment.

_Hm. Maybe?_

Austin jogged toward the mansion, past the pool and toward the pool house. The windows were dark.

He tried the door - it was unlocked. The living room was empty.

"Ally?"

Nobody answered, but he could hear a faint rustling coming from the second floor. Austin followed the noises upstairs.

Outside, he could hear the noise of an engine being started. Then a car with screeching tires sped from his court.

She was in no condition to drive. She was in no condition to do anything besides cry.

He had gone too far. Damn.

When he left the pool house, he found Dez clutching the head of his unicorn.

"Look, what happened!" Dez wailed.

Austin ignored him and searched his pockets for a key.

"I'll be borrowing this," Austin said, waving with Dez' car keyes and then ran as quickly as possible.

end (4/?)

Note: Thank you, thank you, thank you for all your kind reviews. So, so many. :) I'm hoping for ten per chapter again?


	5. Brainstorming & Faraway Lands

Title: Night and Day (5/?)  
Genre: dramatic romcom, AU  
Rating: currently T, M for later chapters  
Couple: Austin/Ally  
Summary: Austin Moon is the world's most famous rockstar and due to heartbreak completely out of control. So his agency brings in songwriter Ally Dawson, who is as brilliant as she is desperate. She needs a job - and what she gets is Austin Moon's crazy everyday life.

Chapter 5 - Brainstorming & Faraway Lands

It was easy to track her down, mostly because her car died around two blocks down the road. Austin left the car he had borrowed from Dez, a orange and green monstrosity called Berta, and sauntered toward the car in front of his.

Ally was inside, clutching the steering wheel and crying uncontrollably. Her make-up had smeared and made her look like a panda bear.

Austin knocked at her window. "Hey, there."

She rolled down the window. "How did you find me?" she sniffed.

"You can actually see my house from here," he said and pointed. "Over there, see?"

"That's only because it was a tower," she cried, pointing at the tower accusingly. "Who's house has a tower atop of it?"

Austin chuckled. "C'mon, get in here. I have called car services to take your car - and they won't with you inside it."

"Don't trash it!" she said, a hiccup in the middle of her speech. "I adore this car!"

"It's ancient," Austin tried, but it was useless. When your heart was attached to something, everything else was unimportant.

"I _adore it!" _Ally repeated, poking Austin's chest with each word she said.

Austin caught her hand. "Then let the repair guys to their job and come out," he said.

She immediately pulled her hand away. Except for Denny, she wasn't big on hugs and contact and Austin decided to respect that. He found it weird, though: He liked to be touchy-feely. It made him feel closer to people and he wondered what it made people who didn't like to be touched.

"Are you hungry?"

"No," she said quickly and tried to avoid his eyes. He leaned down far enough to catch her glance and raised an eyebrow.

"Yes," she finally admitted.

"Do you like hamburgers?"

"I don't eat fastfood," Ally said.

"Okay … what do you eat?"

"Why are you being nice all of sudden?"

"Why don't you ask my completely harmless question about food?"

"Do you ever answer any questions?"

"Do you?"

There was a long moment between them.

"I only eat organic food," Ally finally said with a sigh.

That got Austin thinking. "Are there organic cheeseburgers?"

Around fourty minutes, a trip to two supermarkets, three pictures and twelve autographs for cashiers later, they made it with food to the outskirts of the city and from there to a small hill. The look over the city was amazing and while Ally was captivated by it, she couldn't help being cynical. He had known the way up here so easily, he must have brought a lot of people up here. Girls, mostly, she presumed, and she wondered why she was slightly disappointed by that.

Maybe because it proved her point of Austin Moon being a womanizer and disproved her hope that he wasn't? Ally generally disproved of a somehow lax life style - and especially the kind of lifestyle she had seen in many popstars she had worked for.

"You are too strict, Ally," her father had sometimes told her, but Ally couldn't help herself.

They sat on the hub of Dez' car, Austin with a hamburger and Ally with a jar of pickles. Between them balanced two bottles of beer: One regular and one rootbeer.

"O bet you have driven a hundred girls and more up here," Ally said.

Sipping on his bottle, he shot her a sideways glance. "A dozen? What do you think I am?"

"A rockstar," she said solemnly. "And I know your kind."

"Ouch." Austin laughed. "Really, Miss Dawson, I am hurt. Hurt. I would never bring a dozen girls up here. One at the time, if you don't count the twins of the Playboy's October issue."

Ally huffed and rolled her eyes. "So what's the story?" she inquiered.

"The story?"

"You. Songwriting. Singing. Behaving like a jerk."

"There's no story."

"Uh-huh. What's her name?"

Austin looked at Ally and after a long moment, he suddenly found his hamburger incredibly interesting. He started to plig the tomatoes from it and ate them separately. "Cassidy," he said with some finality.

"Your former songwriter?"

"Yes."

"Why did she leave?"

"I don't want to talk about it," Austin said, taking a determined bite from his hamburger. "I'm not good at expressing feelings and stuff."

"Maybe that's the problem," Ally shrugged. She examined her soon to be eaten pickle in her hand. "I have stage fright because my eaminer during my music school exam screamed at me and told me I was wasting his time. I never performed after that - because if I don't perform, I can't fail."

Austin stared at her, his half eaten hamburger frozen on the way to his mouth.

She met his eyes oer her pickle. "Think you can top that?" she asked quietly.

"Reverse psychology?"

"It works with Denny - sometimes," she smiled.

There was a long silence between them. Austin finished his hamburger and after a few minutes Ally suspected he would never answer, but then, much to his surprise, he said:

"She said she couldn't handle me."

"What exactly was it she couldn't handle?"

"Everything?" he suggested. "I'm too loud, too childish, too generous with everyone's time, too chaotic, too impatient, too possessive, too jealous, I don't know when to stop, just everything." He laughed bitterly. "I'm the world's worst boss." He met her eyes. "I made you cry today, didn't I?"

"Yes."

He fiddled with his fingers. "I'm sorry," he finally said. "I didn't mean to. I didn't know you would react like that. I thought it would just stress you out enough to quit."

"You did a very good job," Ally said. "If you hadn't come after me, I most certainly would have quit."

"And now?"

"I'm thinking about it," Ally admitted. She finished her last pickle, produced a handkerchief and wiped her hands on it. Then, she produced a small plastic bag and put the handkerchief into it and stored the small bundle inside her purse. Austin could just wonder. "Look, Austin, if you want to make this work, you need to change - I can't do this if I basically have to drag you to work."

"I know," he said miserably. "And I want to work, but - I just can't! It's like I'm sitting there and I want to just run away. Or compose an opera filled with sadness!"

"But there mist be stuff you like," Ally said. "Stuff that's important to you." He opened his mouth to say something, but Ally was faster: "Stuff other than Cassidy."

"Pancakes," Austin said without much thinking.

Ally rolled her eyes. "I am Grammy nominated, Austin. I will _not _write a song about pancakes."

"Hmm," he thought about it. "When I was younger, I wanted to be really famous for my music videos - like they would top all the Youtube charts and receive, like, a billion hits."

"A billion hits," Ally echoed slowly. Out of her jacked, she pulled an old, worn notebook. "A billion hits. Hm. Anything else?"

He stared at her, slightly unsure. "I - I don't know?"

"Come on, this is brain storming. What else do you like?"

"I already said pancakes, but you didn't like it," he grumbled.

"Besides pancakes. There must be more besides pancakes and youtube videos," Ally said. She poked him with her pen.

"Vacation?" he asked, then his face brightened in a kind of way Ally found disconcerting. "Oh, oh, oh, I know! Vacation! We could go on vacation!" He took out his cellphone. "I could call my agency and we could go, to, like, I don't know, Reykjavik. I like Reykjavik. It has a really funny name and -"

"We are not going to Reykjavik and I'm not writing a song about that," she quickly said. _God, he had the attention span of a four-year-old. _"Tomorrow, you will get up at eight o'clock and we will start working on a billion hits and the Vacation Song, for the lack of a better title."

"Oh, c'mon," he pouted and scooted closer. She scooted away. He scooted even closer. "Reykjavik is fuuuuun. Let's go there!" He tried to poke the book out of Ally's hands.

"Don't touch my book!"

He ignored her. "Abd getting up at eight? That's like the middle of the night!"

"You need a daily routine," she said, scooting further. "You need to work regularly - it'll help you to handle your heart break and return to life.

"But Rekjavik -!"

"Moping all day and throwing parties is not a functioning workaday life," Ally said, fencing his poking finger away with her pen. "You need to do your job. People are relying on you."

"I'm not sure if I can do that," he admitted, trying to catch the pen.

"I have been hired to help you write one album. And I have a reputation to loose. One album it is."

"But what if I don't get up?"

Her eyes held determination. "I'll make you, don't worry."

Austin gulped heavily and continued eating. No wonder Dez and Trish had insisted to keep her. She didn't only do her own job, but made everyone else do theirs, too.

She reminded Austin a bit of Cassidy - and that was a dangerous thing.

When Dez entered his office, he was of the steadfast expectation to find kangaroos, turtles with donuts and swamp monsters there. What he didn't expect was his best friend, hanging in a lounge chair, playing a video game.

"Oy!" Austin greeted him and Dez, startled, let go of all he was carrying: a huge piece of a plastic crab, several jars of jam and a collection of colorful umbrellas.

Austin eyed those with special distrust; childhood memories and Dez' insistent attempts to get him shoot a movie about a lifeguard.

"Austin!" Dez laughed, exchanging high fives with his best friend. "What up?"

"What up, Dez," Austin laughed. "I just wanted to drop by and get my old notes. You know the ones about the songs I wrote before - _everything._"

"Seriously?" Dez asked. He seemed excited. "You are writing stuff again?"

"No," Austin shook his head. "Ally says it's best to burn them."

"Burn them?! You cannot burn them! They are songs! Good songs!"

"We are currently writing a new song," Austin said. "It's actually going really well, but we are not finished yet."

Dez eyed him suspiciously. "You are writing a new song?" he asked. "What is it about?"

"I tried to make it about pancakes," Austin said.

("I love pancakes!" "I know! Me too! But she wouldn't let me!" "Darn.")

"But instead it's going to be called 'A Billion Hits'." Austin grinned. "You'll like it, it's totally awesome. And this afternoon, we are flying to Reykjavik."

"I love Reykjavik!" Dez cried. He paused, put his hand on his chin and narrowed his eyes. "What's in Reykjavik?"

"I want to see the vulcanoes!" Austin said. "Ally's a total know-it-all and she's totally trying to control my daily routine, but I made a deal with her - I worked a bit and she let's me go to Reykjavik. It's awesome!"

"She's actually making you work?" Dez asked.

"He's working?" Dez' previous sentence seemed to contain some sort of trigger word, because Trish almost fell through the door. "Seriously?"

"I wrote, like, three faces or something," Austin said. "Something like _I'm always improving, always on the move and working on my flow to take it to the ronde-oh_!" The last didn't seem right. "Ronde-oh!" he sang again. He blinked and thought hard. "Or something. I'm not sure. Hm."

Dez and Trish exchanged a glance behind Austin's back. Dez gave her a cheesy thumbs up, but her brows furrowed and she tilted her head to both sides.

_I'm not sure if it really merits one of your cheesy thumbs-up, _she communicated silently.

_Why not? He's working and I get to do an Austin Moon video soon again. Yay!_

_Still! Reykjavik. Ally Dawson seems like a gift send from heaven, but I don't think she knows what she has gotten herself into with Austin. He can be quite a handful!_

_Remember the party? He made her cry. I think she knows what he's like. And you just want to go to Reykjavik with them to see the spas!_

Austin observed their silent communication from the outside and saw the dark, evil glances they shot at each other. Last time, their expressions had been like this, they had had a heated conversation about the importance of Ralphie Hayes and his influence on the dog food economy. It quickly escalated and turned ugly.

"Anyway," he said. "The notes, Dez."

Trish unglued her angry stares from Dez' equal one and turned with a conviction toward Austin he found slightly alarming. "We will accompany you," she said.

"Because of the spas?" Austin asked, carefully.

"No! Not because of the spas! Did I say anything about spas? No, I didn't! Can't I accompany my favourite star on his trip to Iceland so he won't be ravaged by paparazzi, huh?"

"I guess," Austin said, scratching the back of his hair.

Dez huffed and shook his head. He rummaged in his desk for Austin's song notes "Don't forget to pack your sauna towels," he said.

"Yeah," Austin said. "Anyway." He snatched the notes from Dez. "I'll be going. Have fun, you two. I see you at the airport."

Outside of the building, he told his driver to pick up Ally, who in turn was picking up her son, Denny. The huge limo caused quite a ruckus in front of Denny's school, but they managed to get away quickly.

"Dez and Trish are coming, too," he told Ally.

The young woman was busy fixing her son's tie. "They _do _know we go there to write songs, right?"

"I'm not sure what they _really _do know," Austin said after awhile. He turned toward Ally. "Do you know anything about Ralphie Hayes' influence upon the dog food economy?" And off her and Denny's blank stare, he said: "It seems like a popular topic nowadays."

"No," Ally said slowly. "I don't know anything about that."

"Huh." His thoughtful expression disappeared and he was back to his flighty cheerfulness. "It's going to be awesome!" He rubbed his hands happily.

Denny leaned toward his mother. "Does he know that Iceland has around 23 degrees Fahrenheit this time of the year, that you can build snowmen and that they eat half-cut sheep heads for breakfast?"

"The brain is removed from those," Ally said.

"I don't think that's the point, mom," nine-year-old Denny said.

"Right. No, he thinks the _Blue Lagoon_ there is the same one Brooke Shields paddled half naked in," Ally said. "And that everything there looks like _LazyTown_."

"I see. Are you going to tell him?" Denny asked.

"No. I'm just going to mix up the tickets at the airport and book something for the Bahamas. Or Abu Dabi, I haven't decided yet."

"I see," Denny said and leaned back.

But the thing is: Most things don't turn out the way you want them too, especially when a car is following you, colored in an aggressive pink, it's interior paved all over with Austin Moon memorabilia.

Tilly Thompson's obsession had reached a critical mass.

end (5/?)

Ten reviews, you guys? :) And the Blue Lagoon on Iceland is a big, vulcano-heated spa. I highly recommend it, should you ever visit the island.


	6. Walls & Lullabies

Title: Night and Day (6/?)  
Genre: dramatic romcom, AU  
Rating: currently T, M for later chapters  
Couple: Austin/Ally  
Summary: Austin Moon is the world's most famous rockstar and due to heartbreak completely out of control. So his agency brings in songwriter Ally Dawson, who is as brilliant as she is desperate. She needs a job - and what she gets is Austin Moon's crazy everyday life.

Chapter 6 - Walls & Lullabies

Austin dreamed about Cassidy leaving. He remembered her with her pajamas, with her bed hair, he remembered how beautiful she looked in what situation ever - and he remembered showering her with attention, but she would just wave him away.

"I could give you a massage," he offered in his dream.

"Not now, Austin," she said tiredly.

"Or we could go out and eat something," he said. "I found a nice Chinese place."

She was still occupied with the song she was writing. Her earplugs kept almost any sound out. "I'm not hungry, Austin."

He nudged her ellbow. "Or we could buy around twenty bike locks, place them on random bikes by the metro station, get a Starbucks coffee and sit on a bench on the other side of the road and wait."

She ripped her earplugs away and sighed impatiently. It wasn't a real sigh, it was more something of a hissing sound. "Grow up, Austin! You are a rolemodel now, a star! You can't do something stupid like that!"

"Other pop stars trash hotel rooms," Austin said with a small voice, but let her be afterwards. The memory dated around three weeks before she moved out.

Dez had told him to break up with her during these three months, but Austin refused to listen to him. "She's sucking you dry," he had told him. "Keep her as your songwriter, if you must, but don't let her live with you. It's doing no good to you."

"The press conference is at the _Hilton Centurion_?" he asked, refusing to acknowledge Dez' question. It took Dez a moment to answer and his voice sounded slightly beaten when he did.

"Yes," he said. "_Every_body will be there, so you need to be at your best."

Austin could easily play the press. They liked him, because he was approachable and because he answered questions in a half-open, half-joking way. Besides that, the relationship with Cassidy was steady, boring and they showed themselves often enough to satisfy and bore the paparazzi. Those press conferences were a piece of cake.

Austin would never attend it, because before the press conference, Cassidy moved out and Austin's world broke apart.

He still saw Cassidy in his dream, sitting in front of the TV, eating potato chips. Her profile was illuminated by the blue, ever-moving light of the TV screen. The profile changed to another face and Cassidy sat there, munching potato chips and singing softly.

Austin stared at her and blinked and suddenly realized that it wasn't Cassidy, but Ally. Her face was illuminated by the night light of her seat. There was a persistent roar in the background: The plane's engine. They were midair, they were in the first class of a plane. And Ally was softly singing to her son.

He remembered the song; it was a lullaby by Billy Joel.

"_Goodnight my angel, time to close your eyes_  
_And save these questions for another day_  
_I think I know what you've been asking me._  
_I think you know what I've been trying to say."_

Ally's voice was soft and gentle, pure and definitely a singer's voice. He had heard traces of it during their recording sessions, but never an entire song and never a lullaby. He cleared his throat as inconspicuously as possible and accompanied her. Her eyes darted to him, but she continued singing until the stanza was finished.

"_I promised I would never leave you_  
_Then you should always know_  
_Wherever you may go, no matter where you are_  
_I never will be far away."_

"I didn't know you were awake," Ally whispered into the semi-darkness of the plane. Denny was seated between them, dead asleep. "He doesn't like flying that much," she added and removed a lock from Denny's forehead.

"I don't either," Austin said, "but you get used to it. Cassidy and I played computer games on our PSPs against each other. That would help."

Ally smiled. "I'm sorry, but I'm not very good at computer games. Maybe _he_ will play you once he is awake."

"I've seen him play. He'll wipe me off the map."

Ally smiled it response, but it was a guarded, toothless smile. She was clutching her cellphone with one hand and Austin could see the screen shimmer and a picture with someone red-haired through her fingers.

"Did something happen?" Austin asked.

"The inevitable," Ally mused. She gently stroked Denny's hair, then pulled his blanket up some more. Their eyes met over his head. "The press has learned about me - and they know we aren't on our way to Iceland. You should have gotten a message from Dez, too."

Austin took out his cellphone and rummaged through his dozens and dozens of text messages. _Selena Gomez, Justin Bieber, again Selena Gomez, an angry one from Justin Bieber, Selena Gomez having both him and Justin Bieber in BCC with some angrier words returned, Miley Cyrus, Debbie Ryan _- it took him a moment to identify Dez' picture and open his message.

'_Austin - they know about Ally. Public opinion still hasn't decided between Ally the songwriter and Ally, Austin Moon's new love interest. Would be exceedingly super if you two came back with a bunch of new songs, so we have something to show off at the unavoidable press conference. BTW, am in Iceland. Love the Blue Lagoon, no Brooke Shields. FYI, Trish's threatening to kill ya. CU, Dez.'_

"Have you ever been to a press conference before?" Austin asked and looked up.

"Not as a featured item," Ally said. She played with her hair and looked like she would start to nibble on it. "I knew it would happen, but still - the public interest seems to be enormous."

"How do you know that?" Austin frowned.

She lifted her cellphone for him to see. "Twitter," she said, then pointed at over her shoulder. "Also, row twenty two to twenty six had a discussion about it, after someone in row fourty six reported us to TMZ. And you have been talking in your sleep about Cassidy, so people kind of know about that too."

And elderly lady leaned forward and squeezed her head in-between the rift between Denny's and Austin's seat. "It's good that she's gone, dearie," she told a completely horrified Austin. "If she really didn't like Dougie the Dolphin, it wasn't worth it. My grandchildren love Dougie the Dolphin."

Austin leaned toward Ally. "When I was talking in my sleep, would it have been too much of a favor to shut me up?"

"Ho doesn't like Dougie the Dolphin?" the person next to Ally asked.

"Who are you?" Austin asked.

"Jane," the girl, Jane, said. "Say, would you consider dating a fruitarian, especially since you like dolphin's so much?"

"What's a fruitarian?" Austin asked.

"They believe everything that didn't fall off a tree by itself got murdered," Ally said, without even blinking.

Austin stared at Jane, then at Ally, then leaned even closer toward his songwriter over the sleepy Denny. The elderly woman was still in the way. Austin and her face were close - and she started waggling her eyebrows.

"Would you mind some privacy?" Austin asked.

The woman smiled, then looked at Ally and back at Austin. She winked. "Your new songwriter is cute," she said, then her face disappeared, as she leaned back into her own seat.

Once they were relatively alone, Austin started speaking again. "Don't worry about the press conference," he said. "Dez and Trish are really good at organizing these kind of things and if you don't manage to get the magical words 'no comment' out in time, Trish will. One of her hobbies includes torturing the press. She's really good at it."

Ally held Austin's eyes, then looked away quickly. He wasn't sure if she was blushing, but something had made her uncomfortable. She didn't like her book to be touched and she didn't like touching people. Maybe his closeness made her uncomfortable? He couldn't be sure.

"I'm looking forward to see Bahamas," Ally said. "It will probably be my last trip where I am just like everybody else."

Austin didn't think she was just like everybody else. If she were, the world would probably be better at cleaning up, punctuation and liked pickles more, but he knew what she meant. Right before his first huge gig on national television, he had gone bowling with his parents, well aware that afterward it would be impossible. And now it was mostly impossible.

If not for the huge number of privately owned islands on the Bahamas, he could probably throw a stone and it would hit a fan. They were everywhere, but now only to see him.

Soon, they would want to meet Ally, too, even if only for her association with him.

He smiled and looked at Denny. It would be fun - to see the world through their eyes. And it felt a bit less like running away, something he had done the last months tirelessly.

Everything felt less like a _running from _and more like a _running from._

Denny found _everything _interesting. After the plane landed and they had left the Nassau airport for the house Ally had rented, Denny had proceeded to inspect _every _palm and _every _grain of sand. Instead of pigeons, parrots sat in the trees. The air smelled differently and the swooshing sound of the sea was a constant companion.

A taxi dropped them off at a beach. Austin felt completely lost, standing next to his luggage, but Ally picked hers up and started to walk. She had been here before, as had Denny.

"How did you rent this place so quickly?" Austin asked when a beach house appeared around a small collection of palm trees.

"The Bahamas are home to indigenous species, many of whom have not yet been properly researched," Ally said.

Austin wondered what that explanation had to do with renting a place quickly.

"For example the family of the trochilidae," Ally said.

She received the expected blank look from him.

"Humming birds, Austin," she said and the entire situation still didn't make any sense to him. Rent, humming birds, Denny already knowing the way - what the …?

And then Denny cried: "Grandma!" And ran toward a woman with similarly dark hair like Ally's.

A strange feeling of _déja vu _overcame Austin as he looked at the face smiling at Ally over Denny's shoulder. It was beautiful and bright and shone - and looked very familiar.

"Hello, Ally," Mrs. Dawson said and hugged her daughter. Then she eyed Austin. "Hellooo …" she said slowly and glanced from Ally to Austin and back to her daughter. Her smile was still bright, but questioning.

"Don't get any ideas, mom," Ally said. "That's Austin Moon, my boss."

"Your boss?" Mrs. Dawson asked, her eyebrows rising higher. Ally knew exactly what was in that look and included in her mother's rising eyebrows:

_That's your boss? He's really cute, his hair flops just the right way - and does he work out? He sure looks like he works out. And he is good-looking and you dragged him all over here to the house of your old mother? What exactly is the plan here? Are you intending to marry him? You'd have such cute grandchildren. Does your father know about this? A_

Ally cleared her throat and her mother remembered her manners. "You are young enough to be my son, so there's no way I'm going to call you Mr. Moon," she said and before Austin could answer, he was pulled into a firm hug. "Austin, nice to meet you."

"Nice to meet you, too," Austin managed.

"She does that with everyone," Denny commented. "Don't be alarmed."

"Thanks," Austin said and followed the Dawson women toward the house by the sea.

"Mom's a research biologist, specialising on evolutionary development and diffusion of animals," Ally explained. "Last year, she spend most her time in Africa and since this winter, she's here on the Bahamas."

"I see," Austin mumbled. Father owns a music store, mother is a biologist. They couldn't be any different.

"So, what is it you do?" Mrs. Dawson asked, while she helped Denny drag his luggage over to the house.

"Uhm," Austin exchanged a glance with Ally and all he got in return was a shrug and an expectant smile. So he chose the truth. A watered down, modest truth, so modest it bordered on laying, but a truth nonetheless. "I'm a singer."

"A singer, huh? Are you any good?" Mrs. Dawson seemed completely unaware of him, his career or pop culture of the last century.

"I'm not sure," Austin said. "I let others be the judge of that."

"That's for the best," Mrs. Dawson said. "So Ally's working for you, huh? So you must be _kinda _famous, right?"

_Kinda famous. _Austin didn't know if Austin cups, posters, computer games, barbie dolls, key chains, comic books, underwear collections or cover bands qualified as _kinda famous_, but he just resorted to:

"Kinda, yes." He could see Ally biting back her laughter.

When they entered the house, Austin understood why he had been dragged here. It was everything his home wasn't: It was cozy, full of warm colors, of polished food, of walls consisting solely of windows and of the ocean everywhere.

On the piano by the veranda door stood a assembled collection of pictures - they passed them on Mrs. Dawson's tour of the house and Austin could see many pictures of Mr. and Mrs. Dawson, of Ally, Denny and the Dawsons or just of the Ally and her son, however two pictures featured Denny in the arms of a dark-haired man with floppy hair.

"C'mon, Austin, I'll show you your room," Mrs. Dawson said and he obediently followed her her upstairs. A long corridor with several doors to each side opened in front of him and Mrs. Dawson lead him toward the last room. "It used to be my father's room," Mrs. Dawson said as she motioned toward the room filled with books and maps.

It looked like a room out of an old English mansion, Austin found. A golden, polished telescope stood by the window next to an antique looking globe. It was cozy, but from another century.

"So, who are you really?" Mrs. Dawson asked.

Austin, surprised at the question, turned around. "I beg your pardon?"

"To Ally. Are you her boyfriend?"

Austin's eyes widened in surprise. "Her boyfriend? No! What makes you think I'm her boyfriend?"

Mrs. Dawson digested the words, then tilted her head. "She must really like you then," she said and after a moment of consideration, she added: "Or she is really desperate. Ally usually doesn't like other people."

"What do you mean, she doesn't like …?"

"She doesn't like her stuff or herself to be touched, both figuratively and literally" Mrs. Dawson said. "And she doesn't like to be close to people. At all. So you must either be special to her or she must be desperate. I need to talk to Lester about this," Mrs. Dawson added and it took Austin a moment to understand that _Lester _was probably Mr. Dawson, Ally's father.

"Why is it that she doesn't like to be close to people?" Austin wanted to know. "She just seemed regular to me in that respect."

"Try touch her book and you'll see," Mrs. Dawson said and Austin remembered a particular incident.

"Oh."

"Anyway, since she's your songwriter, I guess you guys will be working," Mrs. Dawson said. "You can use the piano downstairs, but please, if you feel like an artist and inspiration is hitting you like lightning at four in the night, just turn around and continue to sleep. Inspiration will knock you out again."

She left and Austin put down his bags and looked around. It was a nice room. It reminded him of his parents house before they moved to the mansion just opposite his. It reminded him of High School and childhood. It reminded him of an entirely different life.

"Hey."

Austin turned to see Ally leaning in the door frame. "Like your room?"

"Sorry for trying to drag you to Reykjavik and thanks for dragging me somewhere warmer instead," he said.

"You are welcome," Ally said. "Though I wish you wouldn't just follow every crazy idea you have - and mess up everyone's daily schedule." She pointed at her cell phone. "Trish texted me and threatened to kill you."

"Naah, she won't do that, my revenue is way too high," he said. "So this is your parents' house?"

"My grandparents' house, actually," Ally said. "Mom's staying here as long as she's working here. And I figured you'll be away from everything as long as you are here."

"You are good at this kind of stuff - making people work," Austin said as he followed her out of the room.

They went down the stairs and back into the living room. Only a counter was dividing the kitchen from the rest of the house and Ally went behind it, opened the fridge and offered Austin a bottle of coke.

"I'd rather have beer, if you don't mind," he said.

"Do you get drunk easily?"

"From beer?" He laughed. "No. Not at all. Nobody gets drunk from just _one _beer."

Something flashed in Ally's eyes and she took out a bottle too. He opened his on the counter and when she tried, the cap didn't move. Austin gently took the bottle from her hands and opened it for her. "Are you sure you want to drink that?"

"Nobody gets drunk from just _one _beer," she said, taking the bottle back from him.

"I have a bad influence on you," he laughed and followed her out onto the veranda. It took her three bottles and an exceedingly long drawn conversation about cloud watching to make Austin understand that Ally could do anything but hold her liquor.

He had to admit she got - in a completely non-romantic, non-sexual way - completely adorable the more drunk she got and she started to call him names by the time he lead her back into the house.

"You, sir," she slurred. "Are the most irresponsible, detestable, childish, immature person I have ever met." She waved his hands away and proceeded to stumble through the living room.

Austin watched amused as she rounded the wing chair twice and while she was on her second round, a new voice said:

"She doesn't get that from me." Mrs. Dawson was sitting by the kitchen counter on a bar chair, sipping on a cup with tea, presumably. She was on the phone - the muffled voice from the other side was male. "Mr. Dawson," Mrs. Dawson mouthed silently.

"Uhm," Austin managed, but Mrs. Dawson just waved with some disinterest.

"Go ahead and carry her upstairs and make sure you don't wake Denny," she said and Austin did as he was told. Austin helped Ally up the stairs and listened to her string of inanities.

"You should have seen Selena Gomez!" she slurred. "She's so talented and so fearless. She's everything I'm not."

Austin got her into her room, removed her shoes and managed to get her under the sheets. She blinked at him tiredly, almost half out. She was cute, he had to admit. Cute and adorable.

"I can't understand why Cassidy would leave such an immature, irresponsible, immature guy like you," she mumbled. She squinted a bit, but was completely serious.

"You say '_immature'_ twice," Austin said quitely.

"I know," Ally told him. "Because you are really immature. It was to _empa_ - _empisize_ - to stress my point."

Part of him knew them that there was a bit of her he would probably never understand. He didn't know _why _he would never understand it and he didn't know why he wished he would, because Ally was everything he didn't look for in a girl.

She was pretty and cute, but not beautiful in the classical sense; she was a bookworm and a nerd; she never attended parties, not if her life depended on it; she made him feel like he was loosing control all them time - on her terms, however, and she was almost always collected; she would have been a cat lady or a librarian or both hadn't she become a songwriter and she was really not that pretty. Not Selena Gomez or Cassidy Kennedy pretty.

"Good night," he said and tugged the blanket tighter around her. Her hair was sprawled out on the pillow and her hands tightly grasped the blanket.

Behind him, a someone cleared their throat. He found Denny clawing his blanket, looking a mixture of being afraid and being bemused.

He seemed to fight with himself, but then he sighed, obviously giving in into the rational decision his mind was providing him with. "Are you going to tug me in, too?" He nodded over his shoulder. "Grandma's still talking to granddad and the giggling has gone overboard and I don't was to intrude."

"Uhm, sure," Austin said. "But I'm not sure how to do this?"

Denny looked at him as if he head grown horns, then decisively took Austin's hand. "You just have to put me to bed, check my room for monsters and tell me they don't exist. Usually that works."

"Why don't you do it yourself?" Austin inquired.

Denny rolled his eyes at the obviousness of the question. "I'm sixty pounds tops and you are around twice my size. Your chances of survival are much higher."

"Gee, thanks."

"You are welcome," Denny said. "And please don't drink alcohol with my mother. She once got drunk by sniffing on cough syrup."

"I keep that in mind," Austin said and accompanied Denny to his room. He tugged him in, looked for the monsters, reassured him that all was going to be fine and finally fell asleep, leaning against Denny's bed on the floor.

He didn't dream of Cassidy, he dreamed of nothing at all, which was really an improvement. But when he woke the next day, his shoulder and neck aching, a sleeping boy's nose pressed against the back of his head, he believed to remember a tiny glimpse of something that might have been a dream.

Laughter of a girl coming from the long end of a corridor and the feeling of sunshine of his skin. When he gently moved away from Denny and to the bathroom, he felt the feeling of change.

Good change. The feeling of breaking down walls he didn't even know existed.

Breaking down walls.

_Breaking down the walls._

He went down to the piano and played a chord and hummed along.

"_So find a way somehow_  
_And break down the walls."_

end (6/?)

For every review, Ally gets a pickle and Austin gets a pancake. :)


End file.
